Today’s Power Up is investment-heavy, with Bryson DeChambeau providing details on his LIV Golf team’s new relationship with Qualcomm, plus the addition of $4.4M in combined funding for two startups: Edge Sound Research and Movetru (see More Headlines for that latter story).
That dovetails nicely with this week’s SBJ Tech newsletter, which will provide a Q2 breakdown of the sports tech investment space. — Ethan Joyce
In today’s edition of Power Up:
- Athletes Unlimited Softball League equipping with PitchCom
- Bryson DeChambeau talks new Qualcomm connection
- Edge Sound Research raises $2.8M
Athletes Unlimited Softball League adds PitchCom
The Athletes Unlimited Softball League has equipped all its teams with PitchCom devices to help catchers call pitches during all league games.
PitchCom, which was first adopted by MLB in 2022, now has spread widely across all ranks of softball. Roughly 70 NCAA Division I softball programs use the technology -- including Florida, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Texas Tech -- as well as USA Softball and Alliance Fastpitch. The AUSL is now the first pro softball league to fully deploy PitchCom, which its CEO, John Hankins, called a “natural progression” for his company.
“The next biggest sport for women on television and around the country is softball,” Hankins told SBJ, “And the professional AUSL is the future of softball.”
The PitchCom system can be used not just for communication between catcher and pitcher but also coaches and fielders. It helps with efficient decision making without the risk of signs getting stolen, eliminating the need for more complicated, tech-free systems to relay pitch types.
“It helps speed up the game,” Hankins said. “These games are meant to play in a certain amount of time on television, and it would be a lot harder to meet those demands without a product like ours.”
AUSL Softball Operations Senior Manager Sam Fischer emphasized the role of PitchCom’s technology to improve game flow, support player development and create “the best possible player experience.” The AUSL received an investment from MLB this spring.
In addition to its work in baseball and softball, PitchCom recently expanded into football through the CFL.
Bryson DeChambeau discusses Crushers GC’s new Qualcomm deal
Bryson DeChambeau’s LIV Golf team, Crushers GC, officially announced Qualcomm had signed a multiyear sponsorship, aligning the sport’s most tech-centric golfer with a blue-chip brand. SBJ first reported the news last month.
As part of the deal, Qualcomm branding will appear on all Crushers GC apparel and in team activations, while DeChambeau will collaborate on content creation.
In a video call from LIV Golf’s next tournament in Andalucia, Spain, DeChambeau spoke about working with Qualcomm engineers on projects to use its Snapdragon processors to enhance data capture and analysis on the course, particularly on the putting green where DeChambeau said he is already building some technology.
“We need Qualcomm’s help to make it down into a small, bite-sized product for us, where we can use the hardware and then ultimately build software on the backbone of some other partnerships we’re working with, too,” he said. “That’s currently where we’re at: looking at putting. We’re looking at some AI as well, and how to integrate that model for golf swings. I’m using an AI company right now. It’s helping me understand my golf swing on a deeper level.”
A physics major at SMU who has won two majors -- the U.S. Open in 2020 and 2024 -- DeChambeau is an early adopter of AI who first began working with Microsoft Azure in 2016 on a project about grip pressure. He has invested in 3D training system Proteus and more recently joined smartphone motion capture company Sportsbox AI as a partner after the app helped him win his second U.S. Open. He also cited ongoing work with Google Cloud, a partner of Liv Golf since 2024. (Other league-wide tech partners of LIV include PMY, Salesforce and TikTok.)
Bringing the disparate technologies together is one of DeChambeau’s current aims, citing Qualcomm’s communications expertise as a way of better transmitting and processing data from cameras, sensors and other inputs.
“There’s quite a few synergistic relationships that I have where we’re trying to roundhouse this and [go] full steam ahead with some new tech in an ecosystem that has been quite stagnant for a long time,” DeChambeau said, adding:
“Man, AI is going to throw a quite big wrench in the whole ecosystem of golf.”
Edge Sound Research raises $2.8M from cohort including USTA, DeVos family
Edge Sound Research has raised $2.75M in new funding, bringing the audio innovation startup’s total backing to $5.5M. The latest round, which Edge’s co-founder & CEO Valtteri Salomaki described to SBJ as an extension of its seed raise last year, was led by Elevate Ventures and included participation by USTA Ventures, the DeVos family, LEAD VC, Cartan Capital and Potential Capital, among other angels in the audio and entertainment space.
“It’s all [for] commercialization,” Salomaki said of the new capital. “Contract manufacturing ... and team momentum, so we can execute on the contracts and commercial deals we have in front of us.”
Edge has begun contract manufacturing the units that underpin its “Embodied Sound” technology, which, as one use-case example trialed by the NBA’s Pacers and Kings, can be embedded into sports venue seats to create immersive, sound-emitting objects.
Edge has also partnered with audio equipment distributor Sweetwater Integrations to scale its Embodied Sound deployments in sports venues and themed attractions.
“You can treat it like a GoPro [now],” Salomaki said of the Embodied Sound units. “The idea is that the form factor stays consistent, but we can change attachment mechanisms, whether it’s on walls, seats, whatever.”
Edge now has a core team of 11 full-time staff, including key recent hires in Head of Operations Guido Voltolina (former GM at Dolby) and Lead Broadcast Engineer Dave Grundtvig (whose career as an audio engineer spans more than four decades and includes work on NBA, NHL, NFL and Masters broadcasts).
Salomaki said the company plans to raise a Series A next year.
More headlines from SBJ
- Movetru raises pre-seed funding, launches product
- ESPN, Big East reunite with streaming rights deal
- Diverse Representation, Wasserman collaborate on Black women in sports study
- Cardinals to launch luxury travel, hospitality offering for road games
- NHLPA, NHL Board of Governors ratify new CBA
- Quartexx taps AHL exec to lead women’s hockey